Cooling system for continuous casting installations

ABSTRACT

A continuous casting installation with a structure for cooling the mold. The continuous casting mold is provided with a cooling means formed in part by a pair of opposed upper arms which extend from the mold. A carriage means is provided for moving the mold, and this carriage means has a pair of arms extending beneath and engaging the upper arms of the mold so that the arms of the carriage means form a pair of lower arms coacting with the upper arms to support the mold on the carriage means. The upper arms form part of a cooling means for the mold, while the lower arms of the carriage means are formed with passages through which cooling fluid is directed to and from the cooling means of the mold. In this way it becomes possible to simply separate a mold from the carriage means with an automatic separation of the cooling connections, and a new mold, of a different size, for example, can replace the old mold, with the connections for the flow of cooling fluid being automatically made simply by mounting of a new mold on the carriage means.

[ 1 June 6,1972

COOLING SYSTEM FOR CONTINUOUS CASTING INSTALLATIONS Inventors: Otmar Kleinhagauer; Peter Cerwenka;

Ewald Neubauer, all of Kapfenberg, Aus- Gebr. Bohler 8: Co. Aktiengesellschaft, Vienna, Austria May 12, 1971 Appl. No.: 142,771

Related US. Application Data Continuation of Ser. No. 773,622, Nov. 5, 1968, aban- Int. Cl.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS 1,323,947 3/1963 France "164/283 520,035 4/1940 Great Britain... ....l64/82 204,342 5/1966 Sweden l 64/83 Primary Examiner-R. Spencer Anne Attorney-Arthur O. Klein [57] ABSTRACT A continuous casting installation with a structure for cooling the mold. The continuous casting mold is provided with a cooling means formed in part by a pair of opposed upper arms which extend from the mold. A carriage means is provided for moving the mold, and this carriage means has a pair of arms extending beneath and engaging the upper arms of the mold so that the arms of the carriage means form a pair of lower arms coacting with the upper arms to support the mold on the carriage means. The upper arms form part of a cooling means for the mold, while the lower arms of the carriage means are formed with passages through which cooling fluid is directed to and from the cooling means of the mold. In this way it becomes possible to simply separate a mold from the carriage means with an automatic separation of the cooling connections, and a new mold, of a different size, for example, can replace the old mold, with the connections for the flow of cooling fluid being automatically made simply by mounting of a new mold on the carriage means.

PATENTEDJUH 61972 SHEET 1 B? lnven/ors:

QTMAR KLElA/HAGAUER.

PETER QERWEA/KA v E M R R D T QT v A A B a V .l E E M u IT Y we A w E PATENTEDJUH 6 I972 SHEET 2 OF 2 FIG. 3

FIG. 4

hwmfors; OTMAR mama wave? PETER cE AM/ n/KA EWAk NEVBAUER Vii/2m.

THEFQ ATToQ IE v COOLING SYSTEM FOR CONTINUOUS CASTING INSTALLATIONS RELATED APPLICATION This application is a continuation of application Serial No. 773,622, filed Nov. 5, 1968, and now abandoned.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to continuous casting installations, and in particular to structure for cooling such installations.

Thus, the present invention may be used with that type of structure where a continuous casting mold is mounted on a suitable supporting structure with the molten metal for the continuous casting being derived, for example, from the electrical remelting of'a metal such as steel, for example.

It is in general known, in installations of this latter type, to use pipes and/or hoses for directing a cooling medium to and from the mold. Such a mold may be provided at its exterior wall with connections by which the pipes or tubes and hoses may be releasably interconnected threadedly with each other in order to provide for the flow of the cooling fluid which cools the mold. It is, of course, clear that in installations where the mold is carried by a carriage which moves along a column, flexible, movable hoses are used for the supply and discharge of the cooling medium, such hoses being directly connected through suitable threaded fittingsto the exterior wall of the mold. However, in the case where relatively large installations are used,there is in general a requirement of being able to operate with molds of different sizes, with these molds of different sizes being selectively mounted interchangeably upon the same mold carriage. As a result, when it becomes necessary to exchange one mold for another, there is the disadvantage that the conduits for the cooling medium, whether they be pipes, hoses, or the like, must be disconnected from the mold which is to be removed from the mold carriage and connected to the new mold which is placed on the mold carriage.

A further disadvantage of this latter type of arrangement resides in the fact that during servicing of the installation and during charging of the same with a new electrode, as well as during removal of the ingot or other casting resulting from the molding operations,-the flexible hoses which are situated in the region of the mold get in the way and do not permit all of these required operations to be smoothly carried out without hindrance from the hoses for the cooling fluid.

It should be noted that there are known holders for continuous casting molds which include a table-like component on which the mold rests and in which passages are provided for the cooling medium tov flow through on its travel to and from the mold. The openings of these passages are situated within the surfaces on which the mold rests when carried by the table-like component, and these openings are surrounded by sealing members situated in grooves. Such a table-like component could not be effectively used in an installation where the continuous casting is carried out by remelting of metal electrically, since in this latter type of installation the mold must, at the beginning of the operation, rest in a fluid-tight manner directly upon a base plate which is situated beneath the mold and which carries the case ingot, block, or the like as the mold slowly rises while the solidified cast metal continues to build upwardly from the base plate into the interior of the mold where the metal initially is in a molten condition and solidifies as the mold moves upwardly.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is accordingly a primary object of the present invention to provide for an installation of the above general type a cooling structure which will avoid the above drawbacks.

Thus, it is an object of the invention to provide for a continuous casting mold a supporting structure which makes it easily possible to exchange one mold for another, while using the same mold carriage, without requiring any disconnection of cooling conduits of any type from the mold which is I removed and reconnection of such conduits with a new mold which replaces the old mold. Y

Thus it is the object of the invention to provide a construction which greatly reduces the amount of work required in connection with exchanging one mold for another.

Also, it is the object of the invention to provide a construction which enables the conduits for the cooling fluid to be situated at locations where they will in no way interfere with the servicing of the installation and with the charging of the same with a new electrode, or in fact with the transporting of the cast ingot away from the base plate at the end of the molding operations.

In accordance with the invention the mold has an upper region provided with a pair of opposed outwardly directed arms which form part of a cooling means for the mold. A carriage means is provided for supporting the mold, and this carriage means has a pair of arms which extend beneath and engage the upper arms of the mold to form a pair of lower arms respectively engaging these upper arms. These lower arms, which form part of the carriage means, are hollow to form passages for a cooling fluid, and the upper arms, which form part of the mold and the cooling means for the latter, are also hollow and communicate at their interiors with the lower arms. In this way a cooling fluid can be directed to the hollow arms of the carriage means and through the hollow arms of the mold to flow through a cooling means of the latter, and the mold can simply rest with its arms on the arms of the carriage means to establish a connection with the supply and return for the cooling fluid. This connection is interrupted whenever a mold is removed from the carriage means and reestablished when a new mold replaces an old mold on the same carriage means.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS The invention is illustrated by way of example in the accompanying drawings which form part of this application and in which:

FIG. 1 is a schematic elevation of an installation provided with the features of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a plan view of the structure of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a sectional elevation ofthe mold and a part of the supporting structure therefor, as seen from the left with the plane of F IG.3 containing the axis of the mold which is illustrated in FIG.3 at an enlarged scale, as compared to FIGS. 1 and 2, with FIG. 3 showing not only details of the cooling means of the mold but also part of the structure of the carriage means which supports the mold, and

FIG. 4 is a fragmentary sectional elevation taken along line A-B of FIG. 2 and showing guide structure for determining the location of the mold on the carriage means.

DESCRIPTION OF A PREFERRED EMBODIMENT Referring now to the drawings, the continuous casting mold is provided with an inner wall 11 and has a pair of opposed outwardly directed arms 14 and 17 situated at an upper end region of the mold l0 and forming a pair of upper arms of the assembly described below. These upper arms 14 and 17 respectively rest upon a pair of lower arms 21 and 24 which form part of the carriage means 20. These arms 21 and 24 provide the carriage means 20 with a substantially bifurcated configuration where the arms 21 and 24 extend away from each other and part-way around the mold 10 to become situated beneath the upper arms 14 and 17.

I The carriage means 20 surrounds and is movable vertically along a stationary column 30 which is of square cross-section, and a cable 40 is connected at its lower end to the carriage means 20 and is wound at its upper end upon a cable winch or drum 41, so that in this way the carriage means 20 is located at an elevation determined by the cable 40.

The type of continuous casting carried out with the installation illustrated in the drawings requires a metal electrode 50, made of steel, for example, to be remelted, and this electrode 50 has an upper extension bar 51 by means of which the electrode 50 is suspended from the electrode holder 60 which is also'guided for vertical movement by the column 30 which is surrounded by the electrode holder 60. This holder 60 has an arm 61 formed at its end which is distant from the column 30 with a longitudinal slot 62 in which the extension bar 51 is located. This bar 51 is provided at its top end with a collar or outwardly directed flange 52 resting on the arm 61 and thus preventing downward falling of the electrode 50. At both sides of the slot 62 a pair of holding plates 63 are fixed to the arm 61 and are formed with substantially semi-circular recesses 63'.

The flange 52 of the extension bar 51 extends into the semicircular recesses 63' of the plates 62 which are mounted on the arm 61 at opposite sides of the slot 62 thereof, so that in this way the extension bar 51 cannot be moved longitudinally along the slot 62 as long as its upper collar of flange 52 is received in the recesses 63. v

The electrode holder 60 is itself supported from a cable 70 which is wound on a cable drum 71. This drum 71 is situated beside and at the same elevation as the drum 41.

The control of the elevation of the mold carriage means 20 and the mold therewith, as well as of the electrode holder 60 and the hanging electrode 50 with the latter is brought about by way of a pair of electrical driving motors 42 and 72, both of which are situated'at the top end of the column 30. These motors 42 and 72 respectively terminate in output shafts 43 and 73 on which the drums 41 and 71 are respectively fixed. Thus, through suitable controls these motors are driven so asto regulate the elevation of the mold and electrode during operation of the continuous casting installation.

During the operation of the installation the elevation of the electrode 50 and of the mold 10 are regulated in such a way that on the one hand the electrode 50 extends into the slag layer 54 which floats on the molten metal (so as to clean and shield the molten steel), and in this way the lower end of the electrode 50 is situated at-the desired distance from the surface of the molten metal. On the other hand the location of this latter surface of the molten metal relative to the mold is maintained unchanged.

From one of the poles of an unillustrated source of current (for example, the secondary winding of a transformer), there is an electrical conductor 55 which is electrically connected with the extension bar 51 which is made of the same material as the electrode50. The other pole of the source of current is connected with the horizontal base plate 57 made of a metal which preferably is copper and on which the cast ingot or steel block 53 rests at its lower end. This connection to the base plate 57 is provided by way of a conductor 56. Thus, with this arrangement, during the operation the mold 10 is steadily raised while the solidified metal of the ingot 53 continuously builds vertically becoming exposed and situated below the bottom end of the mold 10 as the latter rises, so that in this way the continuous casting of a suitably shaped ingot or bar 53 is achieved.

During the melting of the electrode 50, the mold 10 is cooled by a suitable cooling medium such as water. This water flows through a supply hose 80 and along the interior of an extension pipe 81 which is fixed to the carriage means 20, this pipe 81 communicating with the hose 80. The pipe 81 communicates with the hollow interior 22 of the lower arm 21 which thus forms part of the passage through which the cooling medium flows, and from the hollow interior 22 of the arm 21 the cooling fluid reaches the hollow interior of the upper arm 14. This hollow interior 15 of the upper arm 14 communicates with a space which is defined in the mold 10 between the inner wall 11 and outer wall 12 thereof. Within this space there is a spiral-shaped bafile or guide wall 13 which extends helically around the inner wall 11 and is surrounded by the outer wall 12 while progressing downwardly from the upper space 15 of the arm 14. Thus, the baffle 13 will bring about a circular spiral flow of cooling water at a relatively high flowing speed so that in this way a stream of the cooling water rotates around the entire inner wall 1 1. In this way the cooling medium flows along a helical path from the top to the bottom of the mold and extracts heat from the mold, formed as a result of the melting of the metal, through the inner wall 11 to such an extent that during the relatively slow upward movement of the mold 10, only solidified steel is exposed beyond the open lower end thereof.

The heated cooling water is received ina conduit 16 of the mold which communicates with the lower end of the space between the walls 11 and 12. This conduit 16 communicates with the hollow interior 18 of the arm 17 which is opposed to the arm 14. The hollow interior 18 of the arm 17 communicates with the hollow interior 25 of the other lower arm 24 which forms part of the carriage means 20. The hollow interior 25 of the arm 24 communicates with a pipe 82 which in turn is connected with a hose 83, so that it is through the pipe 82 and the hose 83 that the heated cooling liquid leaves the assembly. Both of the pipe extensions 81 and 82 are fixed to the exterior of the carriage means 20 by way of suitable straps 84.

These pipes direct the cooling liquid to the hoses which are situated at the side of the column 30 which is directed away from the mold 10.

The lower arms 21 and 24 terminate in upper walls respectively formed with openings 22' and 25'.through which the cooling liquid flows, these openings respectively communicating with openings formed in the downwardly directed walls of the arms 14 and 17. The upper end walls of the arms 21 and 24 are formed with endless grooves which respectively surround the openings 22' and 25 and which receive in their interiors endless sealing members 23 made of an elastic material such as, for example, a variety of Buna.

The downwardly directed walls of the upper arms 14 and 17 are respectively provided with endless lips 19 which surround the openings in the downwardly directed end walls of the upper arms and which are substantially coextensive with the sealing rings 23. These downwardly directed lips 19 are of V- shaped cross section so as to terminate in lower relatively sharp edges. It is preferred to provide for these edges the angle a, indicated at the upper right of FIG. 3, on the order of so that in this way an edge of suitable sharpness will engage and be supported by the sealing ring 23 at each side of the assembly.

As a rule with an arrangement as described above and shown in FIG. 3, in particular, the weight of the mold 10 will in itself provide sufficient pressure at the engagement between the lips 19 and the endless sealing members 23, respectively, in order to provide fully fluid-tight seals for the flow of the cooling fluid between the hollow arms of the carriage means and the hollow arms of the mold. (If, however, there are no sharp edges at the lips 19, and instead the seals 23 are engaged by flat surfaces, then it becomes in generalnecessary 'to press the mold at the ends of its arms 14 and 17 against the seals of the arms 21 and 24 by means of a suitable screws or the like, in order to achieve a satisfactorily reliable seal at the connection between the mold and the mold carriage.)

Thus, with the illustrated structure, as described above, during the operation the weight of the mold itself is completely adequate, because of the tapered V-shaped cross section of the lips 19, to achieve the required fluid-tight seal without the use of any additional screws or the like for pressing the arms 14 and 17, on the one hand, against the arms 21 and 24, on the other hand.

Moreover, as is illustrated most clearing in FIG. 4, each of the arms 21 and 24 carries a pair of guide pins 27 preferably made of plastic and received in downwardly directed recesses of the upper arms 14 and 17, so that in this way the location of the mold 10 on the arms of the carriage means 20 will be determined. The upwardly tapering guide pins 27 are preferably made of plastic and are received in the recesses of the arms 14 and 17 which also taper upwardly, as shown most clearly in FIG. 4 for the arm 21 and the arm 14. Of course, the arms 24 and 17 coact in the same way. The plastic guide pins 27 are formed with bores passing vertically therethrough and communicating with threaded bores formed in suitable bosses at upper walls of the arms 21 and 24, as indicated for the arm 21 in FIG. 4. The screws 28 may be threaded into the threaded bores of these bosses while passing" through the bores of the guide pins 27 with the heads of the bolt 28 being countersunk into the pins 27 so as not to extend above the upper surfaces of the latter.

As is apparent from the above description, thestructure of the invention provides important advantages over the known arrangements. Thus, with the structure of the invention it is possible to exchange a mold of one size for a mold of a dif ferent size without requiring any disconnection of cooling fluid conduits from the mold which is removed from the mold carriage and without requiring such disconnected conduits to be connected to the new mold which replaces the old mold of the carriage. With the preferred construction of the invention, it is only required that a mold to be supported on the carriage simply be placed on both of the carriage arms receiving the guide pins of the latter in the downwardly directed recesses of the opposed arms at the upper end of the mold, and no further connection to the carriage means for the mold is required to fix the mold on the carriage means. In this way, with the structure of the invention the extent of labor required in connection with exchanging one mold for another is substantially reduced.

A further advantage of the structure of the invention resides in the fact that it becomes exceedingly simple to situate the supply and discharge hoses for the cooling medium, these hoses being flexible (for example, at the side of the column directed away from the mold), in such a way that the servicing of the installation and the charging of the electrode, as well as the transporting of a finished ingot or other cast block away from the installation can take place without any hindrance or other undesirable influences being derived from the presence of the flexible hoses.

The structure of the invention has been described in connection with an installation according to which electric remelting of metal is provided to achieve the molten metal in the continuous casting mold, but it is clear that the invention can also be used with other types of continuous casting installations.

Although the invention is illustrated and described with reference to one preferred embodiment thereof, it is to be expressly understood that it is in no way limited to the disclosure of such a preferred embodiment, but is capable of numerous modifications within the scope of the appended claims.

What is claimed is:

1. In a continuous casting installation, a vertical support column, a support carriage vertically movably mounted on said support column and having a pair offork-like arms, a continuous casting mold having a pair of opposed outwardly directed arms removably supported by said carriage, cooling means coacting with said mold for cooling the latter, said cooling means including passages for conducting a cooling medium therethrough, said passages being at least partially formed by first wall means of said pair of opposed arms of said casting mold and second wall means of said pair of fork-like arms of said support carriage, said first and second wall means engaging each other in a fluid tight manner thereby forming passages of said cooling means.

2. In a continuous casting installation, the combination set forth in claim 1, wherein said first wall means terminate in downwardly directed walls formed with openings, said second wall means terminate in upwardly directed walls formed with openings communicating with said openings of said first wall means, said walls of one of said wall means being formed with grooves surrounding said openings of latter wall means and receiving sealing rings which are situated within said grooves to be engaged by the walls of the other wall means for providing a sealed fluid-tight connection between the pairs of arms around said openings of said walls thereof.

3. The combination of claim 2 wherein said grooves are formed in said upwardly directed walls of said arms of said secondwall means. I

The combination of claim 3 andwherein said downwardly directed walls of said first wall means are formed with endless lips surrounding said openings of said downwardly directed walls of said second wall means and having a V-shaped cross-section so that said lips terminate in relatively sharp edges, said edges respectively having the endless configurations of said grooves and sealing rings and pressing against said sealing rings when said mold is carried by said carriage means.

5. The combination of claim 4 and wherein said V-shaped cross-section of said lips forms a angle.

6. The combination of claim 5 and wherein said arms of said support carriage are respectively provided with guide pins, while said arms of said mold are respectively formed with openings which will receive said pins for determining the location of the mold on the support carriage.

7. The combination of claim 5 and wherein said guide pins are made of plastic.

8. The combination of claim 5 and wherein said guide pins are directed upwardly and are tapered in an upward direction while said openings of said arms of said mold are correspondingly tapered.

9. The combination of claim 1 and wherein said pair of arms of said mold form upper arms which are hollow and said mold has a wall formed with a cooling passage through which a cooling fluid circulates from one of the hollow upper arms to the other of the hollow upper arms, so that said hollow arms and passage form the cooling means for the mold, said pair of arms of said support carriage form lower arms which are also hollow and terminating in openings, said upper arms also terminating in openings which respectively communicate with said openings with said lower anns, sealing means respectively surrounding said openings to fluid-tightly provide communication between the hollow upper arms and the hollow lower arms, pipes for cooling fluid connected to said carriage means and communicating with said hollow lower arms thereof, and flexible hoses respectively communicating with said pipes, so that through said hoses, pipes, hollow lower arms, and hollow upper arms, a cooling fluid can be circulated through the cooling means of said mold.

i IF 

1. In a continuous casting installation, a vertical support column, a support carriage vertically movably mounted on said support column and having a pair of fork-like arms, a continuous casting mold having a pair of opposed outwardly directed arms removably supported by said carriage, cooling means coacting with said mold for cooling the latter, said cooling means including passages for conducting a cooling medium therethrough, said passages being at least partially formed by first wall means of said pair of opposed arms of said casting mold and second wall means of said pair of fork-like arms of said support carriage, said first and second wall means engaging each other in a fluid tight manner thereby forming passages of said cooling means.
 2. In a continuous casting installation, the combination set forth in claim 1, wherein said first wall means terminate in downwardly directed walls formed with openings, said second wall means terminate in upwardly directed walls formed with openings communicating with said openings of said first wall means, said walls of one of said wall means being formed with grooves surrounding said openings of latter wall means and receiving sealing rings which are situated within said grooves to be engaged by the walls of the other wall means for providing a sealed fluid-tight connection between the pairs of arms around said openings of said walls thereof.
 3. The combination of claim 2 wherein said grooves are formed in said upwardly directed walls of said arms of said second wall means.
 4. The combination of claim 3 and wherein said downwardly directed walls of said first wall means are formed with endless lips surrounding said openings of said downwardly directed walls of said second wall means and having a V-shaped cross-section so that said lips terminate in relatively sharp edges, said edges respectively having the endless configurations of said grooves and sealing rings and pressing against said sealing rings when said mold is carried by said carriage means.
 5. The combination of claim 4 and wherein said V-shaped cross-section of said lips forms a 90* angle.
 6. The combination of claim 5 and wherein said arms of said support carriage are respectively provided with guide pins, while said arms of said mold are respectively formed with openings which will receive said pins for determining the location of the mold on the support carriage.
 7. The combination of claim 5 and wherein said guide pins are made of plastic.
 8. The combination of claim 5 and wherein said guide pins are directed upwardly and are tapered in an upward direction while said openings of said arms of said mold are correspondingly tapered.
 9. The combination of claim 1 and wherein said pair of arms of said mold form upper arms which are hollow and said mold has a wall formed with a cooling passage through which a cooling fluid circulates from one of the hollow upper arms to the other of the hollow upper arms, so that said hollow arms and passage form the cooling means for the mold, said pair of arms of said support carriage form lower arms which are also hollow anD terminating in openings, said upper arms also terminating in openings which respectively communicate with said openings with said lower arms, sealing means respectively surrounding said openings to fluid-tightly provide communication between the hollow upper arms and the hollow lower arms, pipes for cooling fluid connected to said carriage means and communicating with said hollow lower arms thereof, and flexible hoses respectively communicating with said pipes, so that through said hoses, pipes, hollow lower arms, and hollow upper arms, a cooling fluid can be circulated through the cooling means of said mold. 